


in back of the real

by orphan_account



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Dysphoria, F/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-07-11
Updated: 2013-09-29
Packaged: 2017-12-19 04:47:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 5,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/879631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dave Strider, 13, and Rose Lalonde, 15. The back of a school building that's probably comdemned. Two scared kids who want to follow their dreams but don't know how. Three and a half hours every night. A pseudo-friendship develops in the weirdest ways among two dangerously sane teenagers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. the lights are flickering; welcome to the beginning

The thirteen year old boy stands outside of the small double doors, foot against the brick wall, leaning, hands fit in his pockets, one earphone in, the other dangling at his knees, covered by weathered blue jeans. 

Dave Strider couldn't think of a better way to wait for his brother to show up and drive him home from another slow day at school. 

His lip was bleeding. 

Tommy Hopkins had sucker punched him after he made a particularly snide remark about incestuous breeding and flipper babies. As he swaggered away, Tommy had grabbed his shoulder, turned him around, and delivered a glancing jab to Dave's chin.

None of this fazed Dave Strider. It had been three hours since he had been punched and four days since he had gotten into the fight with Vince Anderson, and the buzz was finally starting to settle.

He still wore Chuck Taylors.

His beat-up bomber jacket was still beat-up.

He still listened to artsy rap.

He still hitched rides off of his brother in the same god-awful car. 

Yes, nothing, for Dave Strider, had changed. His wrists were still whippet-thin, and his brow was still furrowed, his mouth still leaned to one side in an all-knowing smirk mostly because of the punch which had damaged some nerves on one side of his mouth.

So of course, he saw the appearance of an average height, average weight, girl to be completely normal. She sat on a bench like anybody would ordinarily do, opened a book and read.

Hours passed. 

The girl was still there, waiting for something. A ride? Nobody but bro was as late to show up to pick their kid up, and Dave had never seen this girl before. High schooler, definitely. Taller, curvier, traces of acne alone her cheeks. Dark lipstick was put on meticulously, and her eyelashes were long, her deep blue eyes cast down, flicking over word by every word. Her eyes were like oceans. And that's as poetic as Dave Strider ever cared to get, who had seen enough pictures of oceans to figure that the comparison was accurate.

"Where's your mommy?" The girl asked. Immediately Dave scoffed. Another bitch. Nothing special about this one.

"Don't have one."

"Ooh, very edgy, aren't we?" The conversation halted, tension still strung between the two, from Dave's shaking-not-shaking fists and the girl's calm reverie.

"I'm Rose," said the girl, "Rose Lalonde."

"I don't need a girlfriend."

"How old are you, twelve?"

"Thirteen."

"I stand corrected -- A real life teenager."

"Where's your mom, Lalonde, don't you have somewhere to be?"

"Do you mind me being here?"

"This is my place, nobody but me comes here. I've customized the place to my liking. See that brick on the wall? Mine. I named it Andrew."

"My mother is late as usual, either sobering up or tearing down the sidestreets."

Mocking, Dave replied, "Ooh, very edgy. Alcoholic mother."

"Not nice to joke about that."

"Not nice to joke about the lack of a mother."

"It's only polite for you to tell me your name now."

"John."

Rose snickered. God, he hated that snicker already. "Your real name."

"Dave."

"Dave...?"

"Strider," he replied angrily, "And I don't want you to say it ever again."

"For what reason? Is that another 'cool' thing, the same way leaning against the wall and not moving for three hours is cool?"

"I don't need to try to be cool."

"I'm sure you don't. Okay, so you don't need a girlfriend."

"No, I don't need a fuckin' girlfriend."

"How about a friend?"

"Don't need friends. Don't have friends."

Rose swallowed and closed her book, blinking unnaturally quickly. "I don't have friends either."

"Oh."

"What happened to your lip?"

Dave quickly brought his hand to his mouth and wiped the blood off of his swollen lip. "I got into a fight."

"Do you ever hit back?"

"Sometimes. Not this time, though."

"Why didn't you?"

"It just didn't occur to me."

"You're a genius."

"Hey, you're the one who asked. You're the one who suggested we become friends. I did not ask you to talk to me, I did not ask you to sit there, crossing and uncrossing your legs. I just wanted to stand here and chill out until I get out of here."

His voice doesn't echo. Rose turns back to her book, and Dave sighs and leans against the wall again.

A white Bentley pulls up, and Dave eyeballs it with curiosity.

"Is that your car?"

"Yes. Will I be seeing you again?"

"Not by my choice."

She doesn't answer as the passenger side door opens and she steps in, heading off with another blonde woman in the driver's seat.

Nothing has changed, and the buzz was finally starting to settle. It had been twenty five seconds since Dave had seen the girl named Rose last, and nothing had changed but  
for the new silence in back of the school. 

Dave took a thirty minute cold shower and crawled into bed that night not thinking of the girl.


	2. you don't miss me, i know

Dave is sharp and he doesn't know it yet, and he shows it when the girl appears outside in the sharp light of their school's back entrance when he asks her a question.

"You stay here for a teacher, don't you?"

Rose smiles and watches the skinny boy stand up off the wall and face her for the first time since their meeting yesterday. His hair is snow-blonde and looks windswept despite the muggy, breezeless days you've had.

He slouches and holds himself up dreadfully. He leans in the direction of his overflowing messenger bag; leather and worn. His hands are shaky and they tell of a fearful child who wants to make friends but doesn't know how, doesn't know how he can stop being so himself, doesn't know how to stop rambling and being Dave Strider in every way. He won't admit it, but it's true. 

She has him figured out already.

"What teacher do you stay here for?" Dave repeats, his voice clear and low.

"I don't stay here for anybody."

"If it's not a teacher, then who is it?"

Rose sits down on the bench she sat on the day before and Dave scoffs.

"You're staying here for me," he laughs, "aren't you?"

She laughs audibly and shakes her head. "You're a child."

"I'm thirteen," he waits too long to snap back, "You think I'm smart enough to be an adult, and why wouldn't you?"

"You fail every class. What makes you think you're smart?"

"Because you're talking to me."

Rose pauses and realizes that he's correct.

"Why else would anybody talk to me," he continues, "there's no reason for you to talk to me at all, you're some ambitious Ivy League my-mother-drives-a-Bentley bitch."

Rose pretends to be uninterested and puts her legs up on the bench. She's wearing blue skinny jeans and a lavender T-shirt. Her arms are being attacked by mosquitoes.

She says, "That doesn't mean anything, Strider."

"You saying "friend" within the first five minutes of talking to me sorta gave it away, so just give it up. You've been schooled by a kid two years younger than you."

"Dave."

"Yeah?"

"You're right. That was especially astute."

"You're damn right I'm right."

"Sit down."

"What do you mean?"

"Sit down, next to me."

"Dude, do you know how many people sit on that bench every day? I'd love to give my legs a rest, but the glory that is the Strider ass does not deserve the displeasure of depositing onto that hell-bench."

"You talk too much, Dave."

"So?"

"I highly doubt you mean a lot of what you say."

He sets his jaw and almost takes a breath to snap back, because he can, but he realizes that he wouldn't say anything of worth. Good to note, he thinks, and he moves to sit down next to her.

Rose Lalonde smirks out of one corner of her mouth as he does, and he can feel how smug she is.

"You've never sat next to a girl before."

"I have," he says, instinctively going to scratch the back of his neck.

"Telltale sign for lying, Strider, watch that."

"I have way too many ways to tell you to fuck off right now. Fuck off."

He's never sat next to a girl before. She was right. Dave clenches his teeth and behind his shades he takes in the entirety of her body, only then realizing just how attractive Rose actually was. Her hair looked soft and was close to the shade his hair was. Her nose was small and ski-sloped and her eyes were deeper blue up close. She smelled like floral deodorant and librarians, which ordinarily would have been disgusting but had some sort of deliriously incredible effect on him now.

"So, Strider, what's in your bag?"

Dave pulls his messenger bag closer to him and snaps with clear hostility, "CDs. Whatever."

She nods and can tell that he's lying.

"I'm not a drug dealer or anything like that if that's the sort of shit you're angling for right now."

"I didn't say you were."

"I don't look like a meth addict," he mumbles but he's wrong; he does. What little she can make out of his eyes are sunken and there are blue-black rings around them. He doesn't sleep.

Knowing the answer, Rose Lalonde softly inquires, "Have you gotten any sleep, Dave?"

"Yes."

"You're lying."

"You know, you can't always tell if I'm lying. Nobody can."

They sit in absolute silence, Rose looking at Dave and the fuzzy adolescent hair growing on his chin and his already developed sideburns, dark and actually thick. He's got traces of acne and he slouches over his knees, his lip jutted out. He appears either defiant or melancholy. Rose isn't sure which is more poetic.

When is the last time I relaxed? Rose wonders, leaning back into the bench and looking up towards the dimming sky. It's been ages since I've had some time to stay calm. 

Dave imperceptibly scoots closer to her. He wants to talk to her but he doesn't. He knows she's smarter than he is and he thirsts for whatever she can offer him but he's embarassed, he's embarassed, and that's not even fuckin' reasonable.

"Need something, Strider?"

"No." he barks, then quietly breathes, "dumb bitch."

"I'm in no way a dumb bitch, Strider."

"You are if you think you can be friends with me."

The white Bentley screams up twenty feet away with them. Rose stands and walks away without another word, leaving Dave to the mosquitoes and flourescent lights and unresolved conflicts. 

She doesn't regret it.

She goes home and drinks tea completely uninterested in the events of the previous night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The story will continue, I assure you.


	3. the suns the only thing having fun here

She sees him next before they expect it. He's sitting outside of the principal's office on a small blue metal chair and he slouches in it with his posture more dreadful with each passing day. He bites his lip and looks down and pretends not to see her and he pretends to not notice the way her eyebrows rise and fall when they make eye contact.

She debates her opening sentence.

Dave bounces his knee erratically as he asks her, "What are you doing here?"

"I'm going to class. What are you doing here? Doesn't exactly look like the best of positions."

"I'm prepping myself for my pornographic film debut. Somebody's gotta have sex with all those European models, and they chose me for the job. I swear, it was so out of the blue. Burly dude with that bug-ugly soul patch begged me for the job. Had a falsetto. I asked them if they could get somebody else for the job but no fuckin' way, they gotta demand the Strider steeple."

He hesitates, taking a deep breath, before saying proudly, "The steeple is my cock."

She sighs and calls, "Dave, did you rehearse that?"

He snickers to himself and mutters, "Maybe a little bit."

"Your lip looks bad."

His hand darts to his mouth to cover a trickle of blood. He looks at his shoes again.

"I got in another fight."

"Looks like you actually deigned to strike back this time," Rose noted, observing the redness of his knuckles, "why not last time?"

"I wasn't pissed enough last time. It's a here and there kind of thing. All depends on what's flashin' through the Strider mind."

"Which usually appears to be folly." Rose laughs back.

"Don't laugh at me."

His response is deadpan and simple; he's not in the mood for banter, and Rose can see it in the way he ruffles the back of his hair and sighs a little bit, moving around a bit. He's holding back tears, maybe. Rose gives him a moment to steel his expression and she's merciful enough to not mention the fact that his cheeks are turning red.

"Don't you have a fuckin' class to go to or something? What the hell are you doing here?" Dave asks, the rasp evident in his voice.

"Do you want me to go?"

"I'm going into the principal's office in like two damn seconds, do you really think you should stick around?"

"I'm asking what you want. Life isn't about what'd be logical if I were in your position."

"Fine, fucking stay."

"Okay." Rose stands, hands on the straps of her backpack. She's parted her hair to the left and Dave lies to himself and pretends that he didn't notice. Rose watches the way he drums his fingers on his knees and pretends that it isn't characteristic.

The fluorescent bulbs above them offer a blue-white lighting to the wide hallway.

Dave stomps on an ant that's been dead for minutes already.

The school is rising against him, Rose thinks, and he hasn't got a chance in hell.

The door to the principal's office opens and Dave turns to look at the woman with black hair, shot with grey. Right before he walks in he looks back to Rose.

He does not say goodbye with his mouth or his face.

He does not say anything.

Rose turns and continues down the hall and doesn't regret it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have this really weird feeling that this story is going to make me physically ill to write.


	4. take me home to my heart

She hasn't yet thought of when his parents (brother) comes to the school to take him home. It's almost as though he's taken permanent root in the place, and it seems like it. This time, when Rose exits the school, she finds Dave sleeping on the bench. 

A mosquito dances around his ear and he sniffles in his sleep.

When his face isn't so tense, Rose thinks, he almost looks beautiful. And he does, in a way.

In a way.

He darts awake when she says his name, hushed, and starts frantically patting his messenger bag, relieved to find that nothing has been taken. He rubs his eyes comically and stretches. He exaggerates every move he makes. 

"I trust you slept well."

"Yeah, you've got no idea. Started counting mosquitoes and ten minutes later, I'm sleeping like Christopher Robin cuddling with Pooh bear."

"I also trust you're not nearly as familiar with A.A. Milne's Winnie the Pooh as you're letting on."

Dave scoffs, "Nooo, I do know something about a dude with schizophrenia and some other shit. Kid should get that shit checked out."

"You've only been awake for twenty seconds and you're already making certain that you're keeping up to speed in the witticism department."

"Yeah, just got hired in the witticism department in Wal-Mart. Had a falling out with someone from the snark department the other day. She said I was a door-greeter. Man, fuck that."

It has taken Rose a while, but now she openly admits her affection for the boy, who is two years younger than her and isn't very hidden about the glances he takes at her body occassionally, but he's so boyish, so brutal, so unnecessarily hotheaded. The flaws, the scars, those are what make him so beautiful.

"What are you looking at?" he laughs, and adjust his sunglasses on his face. Smiling, he sits on the bench and beckons for her to join him. The faux-confidence he's showing is convincing. Dave Strider may be a liar, but he is without a doubt a rather good one. He doesn't show the hints he did on the first day they met.

Rose sits down next to him and crosses her legs, jiggling her foot, and Dave pretends to not look at her thighs.

"Good evening, Dave."

"Sup, Lalonde."

She smiles, and it's not a fake. He smiles back, and he isn't lying.

The smiles fade, and she has a question. He can tell, he's not stupid. Though he's not nearly as invested in the affairs of the mind as she is, he can tell that she wants to say something.

Rose speaks, "When do you get picked up, Dave?"

He answers too quickly, "About half an hour after you go."

"You're lying," she says firmly, "When do you get home, Dave?'

"Home to me is the red light district, Amsterdam. They have a bimonthly parade in my honor. With hushed trumpets, of course. Can't alert the presence to the boy who's changing the world, one whore at a time."

"I'm certain it's fairly flamboyant. Are they yet aware of your ambiguous homosexuality?"

"I'm not gay." he says, all emotion wiped from his face. The mark of a kid who's been mocked for it all too much. She steps back.

"Strider, I want to be certain you're getting home alright."

"You're not my mother."

"I'm the closest you have. Or a really cool big sister."

"Cool is my field of expertise, Lalonde. Stay on your side of the fence and hop off of my tractor."

Rose sighs angrily, "You aren't going to tell me now, are you?"

Dave gnaws on his lip and slouches in the bench, turned away from her now. Everything positive in the air has vanished now, replaced by a tension that must be released. Dave thinks about what was happening and says what he wants to say.

"You care too much. It's not good for you."

"I know that you need to at least get home."

"Sometimes my bro takes me home, sometimes I stay here."

Rose parts her lips slightly and sighs, "Dave..."

"Don't throw me a pity party or anything, alright? Of all of the things that I really don't fuckin' need, that's one of them. I got 99 problems, and pity balloons are at least like 70 of 'em."

She'd be lying if that didn't make her chuckle a bit. She looks at him and asks the question that Dave thought would have been reserved for the first time he actually got to sleep with a Brazilian model. (The day was coming, he was sure.)

"Do you want to come home with me?"

Dave stops biting his lip and looks at her incredulously, shaking his head.

"Don't you think you're coming on a little strong, Lalonde? You're forgetting the pornographic industry I'm involved in."

"There's a time for jokes and there's a time to come home with me."

The tone of her voice is way too sincere, and Dave shrugs.

"Whatever," he says. 

The word always seemed to fit.

"Alright. That's settled."

Domestic, Dave thinks, warmth, color, life, Rose Lalonde. Things come together and finally he can be a part of them. The glee in his face isn't evident because he's turned away from her and he's got his shaking hands in his jacket pockets. Even the mosquitoes don't bother him anymore, and the world turns in a way that allows Dave Strider to feel at peace.

Rose smiles at him when he can't see and wonders what his skin feels like.

At least twenty minutes later, the same white Bentley appears and Rose beckons for Dave to follow her. He timidly grabs his bag and keeps one step behind Rose all the way to the car. He's shorter than her by an inch or two, and that's nice, he thinks. That's okay with him.

The woman in the front is impossibly sloppy but for her attire, a clean white lab coat and a neatly tied pink scarf. Dave stifles a laugh but gets an impending sense of paranoia when he realizes that the woman has a martini in the cupholder to her right. He leans into Rose and whispers, "Is this safe?" but Rose doesn't answer.

"Mother, I'll be taking a friend home with me tonight. I see no problem with the situation."

"That's fine, dearest, sit in the back." says Rose's mother, a voice of intelligence and not one of inebriation.

The car peels out and Dave puts his hand in the middle of the back seat, quietly hoping.

Rose puts her hand on top of his and they pretend not to notice.

Dave regards it as a better decision made by a better man.

And she does not regard it at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm getting a ton of inspiration today, but I think this may be the last chapter posted for now. I feel like I can definitely write more about this.
> 
> Any and all comments are appreciated! I love all y'all.


	5. i've never understood this way of life

The large white house framed by an expanse of sky and rich green grass that oh my god, has to be spray painted. Green as a colour can’t be as rich as that, Dave Strider thinks, as the pearl white Bentley peels into the driveway big enough to land an airplane.

Where there’s smoke, there’s fire, and already Dave can see the way Rose’s eyes truly smolder. 

It could be the porch lights.

It could be the fact that Dave sees a strained relationship between Rose and her mother already.

Rose knows one thing about Dave for sure, and it’s reflected in the diary in her purse, reading ‘Dave Strider lives in a world of theoretical possibilities. He sees everything in terms of how it can be improved, or what it could be turned into.”

When she gets out of the car, Dave feels the absence of her hand on top of his and it’s describable by a wide plane in his heart but he doesn’t show emotions, he never shows emotions, it’s his last choice. 

He steps out of the car and is surprised to hear no words said from Rose’s usually spirited mouth (And her lips oh god her lips her lips he thinks) or from the seemingly jovial (And buxom) woman who drove him to this mansion. It’s not even a mansion, he thinks, it redefines mansion. 

More of a starter castle.

Rose observes his shadow and his slinking posture and reminds herself to tell him all sorts of horrible pathology that could be explanatory or consequence of the fact that he slouched everywhere he goes.

And that’s how long it takes for them to reach the door of the house that’s far too large and everyone in the house feels as though the place suffocates them though the wiggle room they have is more than enough. 

Rose’s room is nestled in the upper level, and Dave’s led to it by Rose, Rose Lalonde in skinny jeans, Rose Lalonde that he doesn’t give a shit about, Rose Lalonde that he met a few weeks ago, Rose Lalonde that he doesn’t think about when he’s taking down the zipper of his blue jeans, Rose Lalonde when he--

He has a problem.

“Dave.”

“Yeah?” Never before has Dave Strider strung together such a run-of-the-mill sentence fragment like the one he just did.

“I can hear you grinding your teeth from here.”

“Impressive ears. And?”

“You have nothing to be nervous about.”

He doesn’t have anything to say, or rather, he can’t, because she’s immediately silencing him with a finger to her mouth as she opens the door to her bedroom.

Rose would be lying if she said that she was an organized person, and the fact that her half-finished knitting and countless novels remain strewn across the floor of her bedroom can’t convince anybody.

The room is dim.

Dave doesn’t remove his glasses.

Rose notices.

There’s always a way to get people to do what you want, Rose knows, and Dave Strider is no exception.

“Casa Rose.” Dave mutters.

“This is more my taste than the back of a school building, thank you.”

“I figured that the dumpster-clogged brick walls weren’t really your style.”

“Astute observation. And?”

“And I like it. It’s cool. Definitely doesn’t make me want to throw up eternally.”

“Well my emetophobia would thank you if I had it at all.”

“You know I doubt it would make the room any messier than it is right now.”

“That’s illogical but I’m going to accept it due to your projected confidence.”

“All genuine.”

She scoffs at him now and he’s caught off guard and the banter was not even near their best and he can tell why now, it’s because she’s tired, and he’s tired to, and why did he come over? Sleepovers?

“Slumber party time, I guess.” he sighs.

“I cannot offer you some elements of the jubilance that is a sleepover, but we could discuss which boys we find cute if that would float your boat.”

“When will you cut it out with the implications that I’m gay which I am really not.”

“I’m sure.”

“I’m not!”

“Prove it.”

He laughs a little bit and looks off to the side, sighing. 

His hair is messy. 

His clothes are ragged. 

His fingers are drumming a machine-gun beat on his thigh and he’s nervous but the straight line of his mouth betrays it when she leans in and she pecks him quickly on the lips without a hint of sarcasm, and when Dave thinks the next time it’s that he thinks he wants it again and he’s never been so close to Rose before when she pulls him in gladly when he steps forward and he’s kissing her again and … 

and it’s pleasant and it’s like a d… it’s like something and … and he doesn’t remember it’s just … emerging … when did this happe … where is he where is she … 

Contours flow in and out of sight and Rose is burying her hands in his hair and he’s lying down and she’s lying down and it’s blurry and slow but also far too fast and when they pull away again and he stands up she’s overcome with a sort of guilt but also genuine bliss.

“What the fuck,” he says.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story's picking up I suppose?
> 
> Thank you very much for making it to this chapter. It's really appreciated and I hope you'd deign to offer me some critique whenever possible.
> 
> ~Grey


	6. it's in the THOUGHTS that she puts in MY HEAD

"What the fuck?" He repeats, this time with a questioning inflection.

She doesn't get up. She sees his panic coming from a mile away.

She sees him open defense mechanisms like a city under siege, block the walls with wit and fire a trebuchet of sarcasm. 

She can't blame him.

"Is something the matter?" Rose speaks, in a calm voice that's not indicative of this twisted feeling of wrong inside of her. What's wrong, what could be the matter?

Rose Lalonde does not jump without knowing what she's jumping into. 

After all this time, she does not know. 

"Something being the matter does not even fucking begin do describe the goddamn sitch."

"Sitch?"

"Situation. It was from one of those dumb as fuck cartoons."

"I wasn't aware that your knowledge of children's entertainment spanned such a palette of discussion topics."

"Oh, shut the fuck up, Lalonde, you were there, you know what just happened."

"I didn't believe you were capable of putting an inflection on your words. Perhaps you could --"

"Rose! Kindly shut the fuck UP!"

He's degrading, he's regressing, and she knows it. Dave Strider does not express emotions. He's stoic, he's of little expression and sunglasses in dimly lit bedrooms. 

"Do you have a guest bedroom?" he asks after a minute, "or a conveniently placed hallway or thick carpeting or something."

"...Fourth door on your left." She's sighing now and again, putting up a defense mechanism. 

Two fortified keeps staring at each other over an expanse of silver and white wilderness and when the vultures sing the battle ends but it never does.

Dave grabs his messenger bag, now ripping at the seams, and hightails it down the hallway in the dark, made darker by a night that got black too quickly and previously sunny blonde hair that grows to a dead straw with every coming autumn.

Autumn comes quickly, unlike the other seasons, and in the morning he can see himself waking up and being treated to a --

He doesn’t care.

He doesn’t care because he’s got Rose Lalonde in his mouth, he’s got the imprints of her less-than-gentle grip on his shoulders, and when he stops in the bathroom his lips are red and swollen and puffy and he tries not to think about it but it was yeah, his first kiss.

It was his first kiss and it was so twisted.

“Well god fuckin’ damn it, Strider, you’re in one helluva mess now,” he says to himself, “Granted, that’s one hell of bodacious babe you just hooked up with a few minutes ago but it was so wrong that the charts of wrong are a thing of the past. Reinventin’ new scales here...oooh goddamn what’re you doing?”

He slinks down the hallway and into the (massive) guest bedroom and falls facedown onto the (massive) bed.

In his jacket pocket, a pebble, a guitar pick. 

On her shoulders, a single jagged scratch from bitten nails.

Everything he touched, he killed.

;;;

She knows something, she knows that she admitted her affection for the boy weeks ago and that it’s been a budding flirtationship, that there wasn’t any way of hiding the fact that yes, she liked him, yes, she, Rose Lalonde, strong and elegant, had developed something sentimental for the boy two years younger than her who is taller than his posture suggests, has broad shoulders despite his whippet-thin appendages, and who just ditched after they made out for fifteen minutes in her bed.

This is what she wanted.

The ability to have a boy who she could kiss and who she could own and who could be hers and yet it’s not good.

He’s an good kisser, yes. He knows rhythms and he’s aware of how to move and how to act, and he tastes like salt and something tangy.

But something is very out of place, some sort of fatal miscalculation.

She definitely completely without a doubt doesn’t care.

She doesn’t.

She doesn’t.

It is three in the morning by the time Dave finally throws up into the toilet and rinses his mouth out and he goes to his bed -- feeling different -- to lie down and pretend it doesn’t affect him.

He practically tears off his belt and rips his zipper in two.

This is probably not happening, he thinks, and if it is then it’s probably the best worst decision I’ve ever made.

Everything stopped making sense several hours ago.

He remembers the impressions her fingers left.

He comes in ribbons across his knuckles and the floor.

He could hate himself, he thinks, but there’s too little time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story is disgusting and beautiful at the same time to so many of you. Please comment if you have any feedback.
> 
> ~Grey

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!
> 
> The author's blog is greyscaleminions.tumblr.com
> 
> Any reviews, suggestions, or kind words, fouls words, true words, are accepted with open arms. If you have something to say, please say it.


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